Beneath A Moonless Sky
by Lady Viola Delesseps
Summary: A poetic retelling that answers the often posed question: What happened that night after the Paris Opera burned, and the Phantom disappeared? A bridge I wrote between the final minutes of The Phantom of the Opera, and the set-up for Love Never Dies.


This is a bridge I wrote to fill in the gaps between the ending of _The Phantom of the Opera _and _Love Never Dies_. I use some information supplied by Gaston Leroux, some by Andrew Lloyd Weber, and some from my own imagination. As much as I love Erik, I do not endorse Christine's behaviour (out of wedlock) while she was engaged/married to Raoul. I was merely using the facts that we have Gustave's character in _Love Never Dies_, and writing backwards to explain his existence. However, I sincerely feel for the Phantom, and for Christine, and their star-crossed love story. Enjoy!

The echoes that so recently invaded the grotto died away as quickly as they had come. Meg held up a hand, and continued on alone up the steps, the mob with their torches obeying the girl's simple gesture of reverence as she quickly mounted the platform and took in at a glance her fantastic surroundings. Candles – everywhere, lighting up surfaces covered with ingenious devices, all in disorder; papers, mostly covered with carefully notated music, some with hasty scrawl. And in the midst of it all, she sighted the seal that had struck chords of terror into the hearts of it's beholders – a deep pewter mold of a skull, still bearing traces of red wax about the edges.

Meg took her breath in silently, looking at the gigantic pipe organ, and then through a hanging at an elegant bed, shaped like a swan. Then she sighted a shrouded figure seated on a stool before a smashed mirror, it's dust cover lying in a heap on the floor, like so many of the others. Slowly, she crept up to it, and with a sudden surge of bravery, she reached out, grasping the corner of the cape, and gave a jerk. It swirled to the ground – leaving nothingness. Meg blinked – then saw lying amongst the folds of the mirror's cover and the cloak something shining white out of the shadows. She picked it up as the mob looked on. It was a mask.

Nearly a quarter of a mile away, through dark clandestine passageways known only to creatures that live in such tunnels, twisting and turning in a tortuous labyrinth, sometimes up half-flights of stairs, sometimes plunging down unseen shelves of stony floors, a dark figure fled. Corridors that had not been traversed since a lad of fifteen was hastened along by a white-clad girl saw the genius that filled these grottoes with music fleeing in silence broken only by his labored breathing, and occasional sounds of what could almost be called a sob.

Finally, he came up against a solid wall where his way diverted sharply to the right. A grate at the bottom led, he knew, outside to the streets of Paris. The moonlight shone upon his countenance – the left side of his face mirroring the panic and sorrow of a man in the prime of his life who has encountered an inescapable truth; a truth unbelievable, and no less shocking in it's sweetness. The look of pain came from thoughts of his actions, actions he could not undo, that he knew he would regret. The right side of his face – the man put his hand to it even as he thought, his fine forehead resting against the mouldering stone – was a horrible sight – a deteriorating mass of flesh – the face behind the mask. He felt naked and vulnerable; uncovered. How was it that moments ago the woman – the girl he loved with his whole being, his whole soul, had looked upon it without a flicker of any horror or disgust in her clear eyes, looked upon him and smiled the smile of love, and then let her love lead her to the action none had ever dared! His only thought was, not for his safety, which was imperiled by the presence of the mob invading his burning sanctum even now, ousting him like an animal from it's den, overturning and sacking the results of his genius, but upon that slight figure, fleeing in his boat at his demand... at his demand.

Nearly ten miles away in the open countryside outside Paris, a sound broke the quiet night. It was not the sounds of the nearby farms, with their soft hintings of animals at rest, nor was it the sounds of the wind in the branches of the nearby wood, but the jarring rhythm of a single horse's hooves eating up the road away from the city that slept.

Breaking away from the beaten path and plunging into the forest, the rhythm continued, and presently, coming to a clearing, the horse was pulled up and a young man leapt to the ground, pulling a young woman off after him. He encircled her with his arms and held her tight, not stopping the press of his embrace until she had no more breath to gasp, and then releasing her with a final constriction. "Christine -" he breathed, looking into her eyes. She allowed herself to hang limp against him for a moment, his wet shirt clinging to his skin and continuing to seep damp into her clothes as well, as it had done during their frenzied ride from the Paris aboard the harness horse. Then she pulled away and looked at him with concern. Not only water, but also blood was soaking the fibres of his shirt about the shoulder; his neck also, which was bare, was chafed and raw.

Christine put a hand gently up to touch it. "Raoul – he hurt you..."

"Are you alright? That is all I care about."

"I know. You shouldn't have come – he almost killed you -"

"Should I have let him take you? And force you with such a question -" The viscount looked as if he was dying just recalling it. "Christine..."

Christine stood in silent remembrance as well, and as she did so her eyes filled with tears. At last the words came forth, sounding woefully inadequate. "I am so sorry- I'm so sorry..."

"Shh – do not worry. You could not help it – you did what you had to. I do not begrudge you for one instant."

Her sobs were discreetly muffled from the listening forest by his embrace. But she did not let it last long. Christine pulled away, still repeating woodenly, "I'm sorry, Raoul – I'm so sorry."

"Stop saying that."

"No – no. I wish you could understand."

"Understand what?" A chord of terror was struck in the young man's heart – after what he had undergone that evening, any lover's faith in his love would be severely tested! She did not blame the flicker of suspicion that flashed in his eyes, but it nearly killed her to know that he doubted her heart. Her sense of duty to a man who had given her no reason to love him beyond sheer pity of the misfortunes Fate had heaped upon his head and yet counterbalanced with incredible talents, which he masked by bitterness, hate and coercion, gave way under the force of her sorrow at Raoul's doubt. She set out instantly to quash it – what she had almost said, what she had almost done – quash it both in his heart, and her's.

"Nothing – no, not nothing. Just – everything." And with the strange irony nature often employs, she laughed. When she had finished, succeeding in bringing Raoul in on her nervous release, Christine realized she was exhausted. Raoul put her back on the horse, which was now rested and fresh, mounting behind her, and setting off for his ancestral mansion. It would not belong to him alone for much longer.

As they rode, the young man and his love, they discussed the things near and dear to lover's hearts, putting all that happened at the Opera Populaire behind them with every inch their horse put between them and Paris. They set a date for the wedding to be in exactly two weeks – enough time for Raoul to notify and gather his various family, and for Christine to make the necessary preparations. The former forgot all pain in the anticipation of the upcoming event – something he had dreamed of since a child, but never dared allow himself to entertain in thought, let alone effuse in words; the latter, in all her joy at being safe with her love again, and in spite of her anticipation of the joyful day, sent back over the dark night many thoughts in the lapses of silence, back through the silence and the night to the man beneath the opera – and those who were now seeking his life.

The clock struck three in the wide curving hall of the de Chagny manor, and Christine awoke. Wondering how it was such a sound could have aroused her from such a deep sleep – for indeed, she had scarcely been able to receive the kind advances of the servants preparing her inert form for rest in an elaborate suite of rooms – she sat up, pushing her thick reddish curls away from her face. She felt as if she had slept a day and a night. There was in her mind a remembrance of the fact that she was here – with Raoul – all troubles behind her, but in her heart lingered a shadowy fear, that, with the habit of shadows, grew until it filled her whole being. Before she knew what she was about, Christine was up, and dressed, and letting herself out into the hall. She was halfway down the stairs when she realized she was doing what she must. She left a note on the hall table – one of the servants would find it and give it to Raoul – that read:

_I have something I must do. Do not worry about me, and do not look for me. I will return in plenty of time for our preparations. God give me strength to do this. -C.D._

She had returned to the Phantom of the Opera.

The shafts of moonlight furrowed their brows in displeasure as they were interrupted in their task of illumining the slumbering chaos of the ruined opera. Intercepting their beams, a figure slipped through the shadows, skirting the great final resting place of the massive chandelier's corpse, and stopping motionless as a final patrol of the gendarme tramped past, held there by the behest of people seeking justice for three men's lives at the price of one. Then all was still. Out of the darkness a voice eerily wafted, on the moted air of the devastation, and Christine caught her breath.

"_Say you'll share with me one love, one lifetime – lead me, save me from my solitude..._"

She had come to do just that – and so she opened her mouth and let music respond, sending the notes and a prayer flying at the same instant:

"_Anywhere you go, let me go too – that's all I ask of you._"

There was silence for a long while, and then she thought she detected the sound of an almost silent tread.

"Christine." The voice confirmed her thoughts, but the overture of footfalls did not keep her from jumping at the soft word. Why she did not quail at the very sound, and yes, now the sight of the man who had almost kept her, at the price of her lover's life, to be his eternal bride in the world he had created where he could be master, she knew not. All she knew was that his silhouette looked the very picture of a commanding presence – and she wondered if he knew. The shadows that hid his features from sight reversed their magic and shone on her slight form.

"What are you doing here?"

"I knew you wouldn't have left." She took a bold step forward, and to her surprise, he stepped back. His voice came, gently, on the heavy shadows.

"You must go. It is not safe for you here."

"I know. But I am taking you with me. You mustn't stay here. They will find you for sure."

"I know of many places they would never find. I know -"

"Please," Christine begged. "You must come with me. For your sake. And for mine."

"For yours?" The Phantom's figure in the dark somehow contrived, along with his voice, to display complete surprise.

"Yes. I have told myself I will not leave Paris without you." Christine's heart shook within her speaking so to her master, but her voice remained steady. The Phantom rejoined,

"Aren't you afraid that I will refuse? That I will stay? And thus you will stay – with me?"

"No." She spoke quickly, and then realized too late it was not true. There was a long silence, and she took advantage of this to advance, holding out something she had brought for him. It was a dark cloak – she knew he was in the habit of wearing one, but also knew it would have been lost by now in the conflagration below, began by the many overturned candelabras.

"For travel." The simple sentence worked wonders. In a moment, the man's hand had reached out and taken it from her's. In that moment, she once again glimpsed his uncovered face – disfigured and pale. His right eye, which was lighter than the other, shone a spectral blue out of the darkness, while the dark blue eye searched hers. In a moment of time, she had become the master, and he the pupil.

"Travel," he said.

"Yes. We must go." Taking him by the hand as one would a little child, Christine led the opera ghost from his haunt, and fourth into the streets of Paris.

In the countryside outside the slumbering city, the road that the previous night witnessed the flight of a harness horse with two on his back, now witnessed the travel of a solitary groom, leading two horses. Past the lowly farm and the majestic villa he went, his destination a post stable, standing alone outside Paris. This structure, with the primary purpose of providing reliefs for the coaches passing through the environs of the capitol, seemed to be empty this night, and he was to be there, awaiting the arrival of several carriages toward morning, prepared to rest their horses, and provide them with fresh ones, hastening them on their way by being stationed outside the city proper, and avoiding the heavier travel and traffic.

In the darkness, a darkness permeated by the smell of hay and the recent presence of animals, a silent figure sat, contemplating in his solitude the questions he would ask Christine when she returned. The most hulking and looming unknown of all, penetrating this whole business, was the great _why_? Why had this girl, this girl whom he loved with his whole being, and yet who no doubt hated him for forcing her to such a choice, between a life with him, or witnessing the death of her lover at his hands, before her very eyes, this girl who had, at the last moment, turned her back on one she had loved since childhood and chosen to look upon his loathsome carcass with some sort of love in her heart, this girl who had yet taken the chance he gave her, in his shock, to leave him, to leave all he had done, to leave his music – the music they made together... why had she returned to him, returned to help him?

His thoughts began to run faster and faster, making his head pound – he put a hand to it, and suddenly recalled that his face was bare – his mask somewhere back beneath the opera in Paris. He had nearly forgotten – nothing in Christine's eyes had mirrored the facts of his horrible deformed countenance as they traveled in silence together, as she told him to wait here for her to return.

The shadows recoiled. The moon had hidden it's face when something small and clad in white shocked them into retreat once again as it hurried along the road, seemingly tireless and spectral. Those that merely turned aside to let her pass assumed that she was of kin to them, soulless, and therefore immortal, incapable of fear, weariness, or pain, but those more attentive shadows, those trained by long hours of expanding to fill every corner of the night, and then retreating swiftly the moment their lord appeared on the horizon, to sulk and plot how to infiltrate even the parts of the day when their lord had his back turned, leaned in the moment she had passed by, and looked after her, muttering unintelligibly to each other. To most it seemed only the murmur of the night, or perhaps the wind, but had you the proper ears to understand their talk, you would have known they were right in saying of their work's interruption, "_She is afraid. She is weary, and in pain._" And then, with a good nature not often attributed to their kind, the shadows kindly bent and ceased their ethereal dancing, giving her only a grave and courteous nod.

Christine at last reached the post stable, and paused for a moment, catching her breath in short ragged gasps. She knew that the ears above her, trained to catch the tiniest hint of a sound or melody, could not fail in hearing the noise she made, but she was too weary to care. Her breaths, short as they were, reached the loft above and the angel of music's ear, announcing her presence in advance. His voice came, to her on the night.

"Christine."

She did not answer, but took a last deep breath, and released it slowly, exhaling her fear away onto the winds of the French countryside, and entering the stable. Warm air greeted her, and the feel of fresh hay beneath her feet gave an irresistible call to her tired body. She felt her knees begin to give way, when there was a soft thump beside her, and a dark figure of a man stood silhouetted against the single window. A moment later and she was in his arms. His face bent close over hers, the moonlight illumining his misshapen skull from behind, but casting it's glow over her features, leaving his shrouded in shadow.

"My Christine –"

"Don't say that," she managed, even while yielding herself to his strength, and feeling the pulse of his heart against her cheek.

"Why not?" he whispered. "It is true."

"It is not," she insisted, moistening her dry lips and making an effort to stand. His grip on her tightened. The angel of music turned and began to mount the ladder to the loft, his burden held with one arm. Christine felt no fear, and clung to him closely.

He lay her gently down in a warm impression in the straw. At last his voice came.

"Why did you come back if it is not true?"

And then she knew that it was. At least for this night, she belonged wholly and completely to this man. He was not an angel, nor a demon. Only a man – a man frightened and alone, for whom she felt a fathomless measure of love. Slowly, Christine raised her hand toward his contorted face. He sensed what she was about and with a quick motion, seized her wrist in mid-air.

The night was so black neither could see a thing, but the warmth of their closeness, and the sounds of their breathing created a living moving symphony of sound that would have been spoiled by sight even had they been permitted it. Christine's free hand found it's home on the right side of his face, covering the scars and grotesque disfigurement, and for once, the man who hardly dared touch the idol of his devotion, knowing his unworthiness to be seen, felt freedom in the blindness of night; and what was more, the girl who had given her whole heart to a man slumbering only a mile away beneath the shadow of his ancestral estate, yielded her soul to the master of her fate.

Once more the Phantom of the Opera had created a world in which he could be master, and was given love he never dreamed he would possess – not by his will, but her's. Raoul was forgotten, the mob was forgotten, and all the two figures in the loft thought of was the other there beneath the moonless sky.


End file.
